The future of the Atelier series remains bright! Sure, people may have been a little worried when Tecmo Koei bought Gust, the developer that makes the series. Not to mention people outside of Japan may have been a little worried about what will happen now that the Arland Atelier trilogy of PS3 games has been completed, but there’s no need to fear. Not only did Atelier Ayesha: The Alchemist of Twilight Land just appear on Japanese PS3s, but NIS America confirmed at Anime Expo 2012 that it is bringing it to North America.
NIS America didn’t have lots of information on Atelier Ayesha. It did say during its panel at the con that it is going to release the game outside of Japan, however. Apparently, it’s in the very early stages of localization as NIS America’s representatives said it will be a few months before they have solid information about the international release.

Like almost every Atelier game, Atelier Ayesha follows a young alchemist. Players help her out over a period of a few years, filling alchemical and gathering requests for townspeople and friends. Of course, there’s a larger, overarching story as well. Ayesha’s little sister Nio disappeared shortly after their grandfather died. Ayesha figured the worst, but one day saw Nio in ruins and decided to see if her sister was still alive. The game is a mixture of JRPG and simulation elements, as there are turn-based battles to fight and lots of items to create.

Basically, we have to be patient and wait for now, and take comfort in knowing that we’ll eventually get Atelier Ayesha. I’m guessing we’ll see it sometime in the first half of 2013.